Advice on finding God & Spirituality

Okay, i know a lot of you will read this and say something like "it's up to you to find God for yourself" or something and I know, I will in time. But for now, I just want to know the paths that some of you have taken towards finding God and believing in him.

I've never associated with any type of religion and even found myself arguing the very existence of God. I need guidance in my life, and I want to accept and fear God without the use of religion.

 

The choice is between love and fear.

Love is the one you want.

Fear has no energy of it's own so you must support it for it to exist.

There is nothing that prohibits love.

 

my advice would be this: it's everywhere, but you're more likely to find it alone out in the forest, then in the meetings and meeting places of religious organizations.

not saying the spirit of it isn't to be found in every religious text as well. but to find it there, you have to reach past the words and listen for the melody.

it isn't to be found in saying one major or minor belief is more right or wrong then another. or rather, at least, not absolutely so at any rate.

christianity is wrong when it says everything else is. same goes for anything else that does. its right that its possible for wrong to exist of course, but wrong consists primarily in fanatacism and chauvanism.

which is why i consider christianity, and along with it, to the degree that it is similar in doing so, islam, the least 'right' of them all.

i don't know why a god would want to be worshipped. it doesn't make any sense to me that one would. but here is the thing, a universal reverance that breeds universal consideration, influences in a positive direction. one which patterns and priorities influenced by it, will lead to the existence of a more universally gratifying world, then the lack of universal considerateness ever can.

 

Wanted to be guided sounds more like fear. Following any teaching must be done out of fear.

 

This is really good advice. First know thyself.

 

We always choose with a guide. The choices are sponsored by love or fear. Only one of those, love, supports you, the other is a liar.

Fear sits on your shoulder and says follow me I will keep you safe, but it's real intent is to keep you from going where you will and to wound your heart.

 

Tigerpaw , the kingdom of God resides within us all .You don't need an organized religion to find him . However it helps if you surround yourself with other individuals on the same path .

The start for you is to read his word everyday . Get yourself a good bible and read . You will see the truth in his words and promise for man . You need not fear God if you love God . He is real and he is great ! The alpha and omega .

The spiritual window to salvation is closing on the earth . The sands of time are running low , in this material realm . While all of us fall short of his glory , his promise is salvation through Christ . The only way to find him is to find his word and believe .

Congratulations on your quest for truth , love and light . You're on the right path . Never let others discourage you or belittle your journey to find a spiritual path .

 

one summer (in beginning the journey) i tripped the windowpane
three times and for each i had a vision of god . one related god to nature , another to the human war of good and evil , and the other to cosmic love .

that fall i was still feeling queasy about it all so i happened into
a psych doc's office for just three minutes . he offered a chair and asked what i wanted to know . i replied to know god . he said there's nothing to know but eatin' shitt'n , work and family .

then after that i resolutely wandered off into one
of those god visions . just one . the most beautiful one .

now , after all this long ramblin' and knowin' time , i think
maybe i'll go to work .

 

And if I reject all guides?

And who do you follow? You seem to have such confidence in what you say it's a wonder that you were open enough in the first place to choose anything other than your mother.

 

Man, god will find YOU!

 

You make choices don't you? You make choices according to some criteria, your guide. Your guide may simply be the flavor you prefer this day, in that case your guide would be personal taste.

I don't understand the reference to my mother.

I have confidence in what I say because I earned it.

 

Well yes, in that sense I suppose a choice that I will have no guide at all is still a guide, a philosophy. Negative thought is not possible. Which is why, for the same reasons, meditation is nonsense.

So you have no doubt at all that you might be wrong? When's the last time you changed your mind about something?

 

“We are closer to God when we are asking questions than when we think we have the answers.” — Abraham Joshua Heschel

 

In that sense as well as others.

There are no idle thoughts. We may entertain thoughts that are dispiriting to ourselves, negative. Why do you believe meditation to be nonsense? What sense do you think meditation should impart to be sensible?

If I have doubt about something I do not share the information as it has not yet been inwardly formed to succinctness.

The last time I changed my mind was a few moments ago when I felt the air temperature to be warmer than it actually read on the thermometer.

 

Sorry I missed this question.

I trust in reality.

How do you know what is real?

What is the same is the same and what is different is different and what is different is not the same.

 

I did not mean negative in the sense of being dispiriting or depressing or contrary to life, but rather in contrast to positive thought --- like a positive number in arithmetic contrasts with a negative number. I don't believe we can experience what is not positive or present - nothingness, eternity, 'the void' are not accessible by us, which is the asserted task of meditation. A thought that I will "not follow anyone" is not an absence of all thoughts to follow someone, but a 'positive' and 'present' thought in itself.

Meditation is only useful for relaxing the body, not accessing "truths". And even in relaxation it isn't very useful as it can only affect the autonomic system indirectly.

What do you mean by information? The sensory data your body has received or your representation of it? And how do you go about removing that doubt, verifying this 'information'?

 

I don't know what is real. Reality is an antiquated concept.

 

A void or nothingness is not accessible because by definition there is nothing to access. I agree with you that we can only experience extant things.

A thought that you will not follow anyone has nothing to do with the nature of what I am describing in the comment "we always choose with a guide". This is true regardless of your conscious affiliations. If you are making a choice you are guided in that choice by what you regard as correct, true, or beneficial. When I say we always choose with a guide i mean the chooser and the guide are both within you.

The effects of meditation depend on adeptness with technique and the desired aim. You can access the autonomous nervous system through those sympathetic functions that operate in concert with the conscious mind, i.e. respiration.

Another use for meditation is achieving altered states of consciousness. By altered states I mean other than normal waking consensual consciousness.
These are states that offer information that cannot be accessed by conventional means. An example would be a coma or a psychedelic drug trip.

In this case by information I mean those things found that provide a functional fit. Sensory stimulation does not give information about the environment but your relation to it. Everything we perceive is an interpretation, an amalgam of perspectives. Our eyes collect reflected light and our minds turn that into vision.

Our minds are a shared phenomena. The reason we can communicate is we are of like mind. It does not matter the language you speak, we can learn each others tongues because we share the mind that uses speech. So I may apprehend mental processes in you at a distance because we share our thoughts. The I am you call yourself is the same I am you call yourself.


I go about removing doubt, or gaining clarity through investigation, study, experimentation. I try to punch holes in my own conclusions and listen to others try to do the same, and am ready to amend on solid grounds.

All we have in this forum is our words and our ability and willingness to communicate in which to make our case. I am willing to rescind my statement, "we always choose with a guide", if you can demonstrate to me a time when this is not the case.

Words are symbols that give us access to the contents of the mind.

 

Do you doubt that you are real?

Good and evil are antiquated concepts, true and false still apply.

What is false by definition is not true and therefore does not exist. So what is true then, is synonymous to what is real.

 

Depends what you mean by guide. In the context of this thread, it's referring to a person or philosophy. I agree that every decision is "guided" by our previous experiences or ideas formed or obtained, but I don't think that's what the original poster was referring to.

Do we know the content of our mind, really? How does the word even relate to it? Isn't the only reason we say we have a 'mind' because we have been inherited the concept elsewhere? It doesn't seem to be verifiable in any other way.

You know, I can't help but wonder if we would have all these psychological problems and issues choosing 'guides' if we hadn't ever formed a concept of mind (same goes for the concept of 'self'). Thinking that we need to change it seems responsible for pretty much all the problems we experience.